Mif Swap and comparable land?

{crossposted from Stop, Drop and Roll}
There is a lot of information out there about the Alameda Golf/Mif Swap unfortunately much of it is pretty bad which causes the discussion to wend its way out of control and into the absurd. That said, I think the swap is a terrible idea, something I’ll write about later, but just became aware of something new about it which made it even worse for me.

The 12.2 acres of possible future open-space in the business park isn’t a single contiguous piece of property. There are buildings in the middle of it and its three distinct pieces of property. Here’s the map from the presentation:

Proposed Sports Complex at Harbor Bay Business Park

But it was pointed out to me today that I wasn’t looking at this very closely and that there are existing buildings and parking lots breaking up this land and the buildings that I thought were going to be parks buildings, are actually a daycare facility and some other businesses. Here’s the same map with the 12.2 acres highlighted:

Yellow is the actual open space

The light yellow circle in the bottom left indicates a piece of land that may, or may not, be a part of the swap. I can’t tell. Here’s the thing, it’s clear that Cowan and company are aware that this is a problem. Watching their promotional video after learning about this, you realize that every time the fly-over gets to a private building or a break in the park, it quickly cuts to a new shot.

And here’s the problem that this possibly causes. The City Charter states, “The City Council shall determine that said “new public park” is of comparable size and utility and serves the same service area with substantially the same amenities and improvements.”

Which brings us to the Charter, which says, “The City Council shall determine that said “new public park” is of comparable size and utility and serves the same service area with substantially the same amenities and improvements.” This is a wiggly word, and I’m sure smart people can argue that “comparable” doesn’t mean “all together” because “the numbers add up the same.” But given that that logic would mean that you could break a 10 acre park into a 1000 pieces and zone them open space and call it comparable and be done with it. This is probably a bit of a stretch. It’s clearly not the spirit of the Charter.